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US ends waiver on India’s Iran oil imports. What next?

By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | May 3, 2019

China’s stance vis-a-vis the US sanctions against Iran’s oil exports is evolving. These are early days. Quite obviously, the Chinese assessment that Iran is not going to wilt under US pressure gives a realistic picture. But it means that there is a long haul ahead and India needs to do some creative thinking. In the improved climate of Sino-Indian relations, a window of opportunity is opening for New Delhi to take a coordinated approach with Beijing.

No sooner than the Trump administration announced in a statement on April 22 its decision that it will not extend the exemption period beyond May 2 for countries buying oil from Iran — so-called “waiver” — the Chinese Communist Party tabloid Global Times came out with an editorial acknowledging that the US decision poses a “tough choice.”

China is the biggest importer of Iranian oil. The Global Times editorial blasted Washington for this “typical manifestation of unilateralism and hegemony” and weighed in on China’s policy options. The editorial offered the following advice: “We think China should clarify its interests and principles surrounding the purchase of oil from the Middle East nation and strive to minimize the loss to China’s national interests.”

That is to say, first, China should no doubt “oppose the hegemonic approach of the US but it can’t take the lead in confronting the US on issues involving Iran.” China will push back at the US by rallying world opinion against its Iran sanctions, but will not take a confrontationist approach.

Second, “Beijing needs to coordinate with other major powers to respond to US sanctions against Iran… There is a need to strengthen coordination among countries. If the issue can be dragged, then let it drag. Otherwise, the issue can be modified. If it cannot be modified, let it be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.”

Third, “The operational safety of Chinese enterprises should be given priority and they have the right to continue to cooperate with Iran or withdraw, keeping in mind the situation on the ground.” The editorial sums up: “China does not want to have a showdown with the US over Iran, nor can Beijing just let Washington do what it wants… we cannot disregard principles or interests. This is a time to test wisdom.”

However, an editorial by the government-owned China Daily on April 23 was more forthright: “Major importers of Iranian oil, China included, have the legitimate right to have normal business ties and conduct trade with Iran, including importing oil from it, should they so choose. The Chinese government is committed to safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of its enterprises and willing to play an active and constructive role in promoting the stability of the international energy market.”

Significantly, China Daily also hinted at willingness to make coordinated moves with other affected countries such as India.

China has skirted US sanctions against Iran before. This time around too, the likelihood of that happening is being discussed by western analysts. China will find the back door, inevitably. Apart from ship-to-ship transfers of oil, China also has the option to continue to buy some Iranian crude through the banks in China that are already under US sanctions.

The US-China trade talks do not complicate Beijing’s policy calculus on Iran oil. The trade negotiations envisage US exports of oil / LNG to China worth tens of billions of dollars. (The Wall Street Journal reported in March that in a move that would be announced as part of a broader US-China trade deal, China’s state-owned China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., known as Sinopec, will agree to a long-term contract to buy about $18 billion of liquefied natural gas from Cheniere,) This eases the US pressure on China.

On the contrary, the pressure is much higher on India, which meets 80% of its oil demand through imports. Iran used to be the third largest source of supply till the US butted in. The “waiver” allowed India to import 1.25 million tonnes of oil from Iran per month (which itself meant a 30% reduction in the level of imports).

Most important, India could avail of concessional terms, which meant a saving of around a quarter of combined costs due to favourable conditions such as prices, transportation and insurance. Equally, the rupee payment mechanism worked to India’s advantage.

India has to pay Iran in rupees for oil imports and money is deposited in a special account in India, which Iran uses to purchase humanitarian supplies such as rice and medicines from India. In essence, it was barter trade that committed Iran to buy Indian products, creating export earnings for Indian business.

President Trump is notoriously tight-fisted and will never compensate India for all this financial loss. On the other hand, he hopes to take the opportunity to expand US oil exports to India, which are not based on attractive trade terms. (Besides, why should India want Trump to navigate its energy security?)

Suffice to say, with the expiry of the “waiver” on May 2, India’s oil import costs (and its US dollar payouts) will rise, and its export revenue will decrease. India’s economic growth and exchange rate’s stability will come under great pressure. The expert opinion uniformly warns that the US sanctions against Iran will push up international oil prices, thereby increasing India’s overall oil import bills. Washington claims to be generous in leaving India-Iran cooperation over Chabahar port out of the purview of the sanctions. But the US sanctions will in due course severely stymie cooperation between India and Iran over Chabahar.

The question must be frontally asked: What are the US’ intentions toward India? New Delhi has reason to be worried about Washington’s real interests, long-term strategy and the uncertainty in ties with the US. The US’ interests and strategy appear to narrow down to using India to contain China.

Mike Pompeo has rushed to claim credit for the blacklisting by the UN of Masood Azhar. Sections of the Indian media are beside themselves with joy. But the same man went into hiding a couple of weeks ago when EAM Sushma Swaraj telephoned him in Washington seeking flexibility in the US sanctions against Iran oil.

According to media reports, EAM said India should be allowed to import Iranian crude for some more time without being impacted by US secondary sanctions, as the general election is underway in the country, and that the next government with a fresh mandate will take a final call on this issue.

But Pompeo ducked, pleading helplessness — only to resurface from hiding ten days later on May 1 with the astounding claim that his boys got China to lift the block on Azhar. What to make out of such friends?

Unfortunately, the government is waffling by claiming it is ready to deal with the impact of US sanctions against Iran by getting extra supplies from other oil producing countries to compensate for loss of Iranian oil. The matrix is not about the availability of oil — as explained above — but about the huge economic costs. Simply put, India is called upon to underwrite Trump’s maverick Iran policies.

From the Indian perspective, what matters most in the coming period will be the scope to create a trading bloc with China that would allow the two countries to buy Iranian oil without going through the US banking sector.

May 3, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

‘A Complete Failure’: Venezuelan Coup Attempts Staged ‘More For The US Audience’

Sputnik – May 2, 2019

Juan Guaido’s third attempted coup against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has failed just like the rest, but that hasn’t stopped the US corporate media from turning it into a heroic mass uprising for Americans to see. An activist told Sputnik the coverage is setting the stage for a war, but that both Americans and Venezuelans would resist it.

Guaido has claimed since January 23 to be Venezuela’s interim president, calling Maduro’s May 2018 reelection illegitimate. However, despite three attempts to divide the military ranks and raise a revolution in the country, Guaido’s opposition remains a small force that’s only proven capable of causing violence and chaos, not of grasping the hearts and minds of fellow Venezuelans.

Meanwhile, Washington officials continue to raise the specter of military force against Maduro’s government, which is still recognized by three-quarters of the globe’s countries as the legitimate government of Venezuela.

Radio Sputnik’s Loud and Clear discussed the situation with Gerry Condon, a Vietnam-era US veteran and peace resistor who is now the national president of Veterans for Peace and who recently returned from Venezuela; and Paul Dobson, a writer for VenezuelAnalysis.com, who reported from the Venezuelan city of Merida.

​Dobson said the country Thursday seemed “relatively calm and stable” by comparison to earlier in the week.

“The events of Tuesday were to some extent, we can say, exaggerated by the international press,” Dobson noted. “There was definitely an attempted coup d’etat, but the extent to which Juan Guaido’s looking to grasp power was a lot weaker than he was perceived in the international corporate press.”

“Juan Guaido came out about five o’clock in the morning on Tuesday with a video message to his supporters saying he was taking a military base in Caracas with the support of ‘the main military units of the country.’ Both of these statements were later proven to be incorrect: he was outside the military base, not inside of the military base, and he had control of roughly 30 soldiers, of which about 25 were there, who later claimed they were tricked, according to their commanders. He later rejected their participation in this, and only 15 soldiers were left, essentially, on the side of Juan Guaido,” Dobson said.

“Thereafter, we saw significant civilian demonstrations across the country, principally in Caracas, but in other cities as well,” the writer told Sputnik. “We saw attempts by Juan Guaido’s supporters to both pressure through peaceful means but also violence the local military commanders to rebel against their chain of command, all of which was unsuccessful. By the end of the day, we saw Juan Guaido’s mentor and main political ally, Leopoldo Lopez, flee to both the Chilean and then later Spanish Embassy, where he is still holed up, and Juan Guaido went on record by calling his people onto the streets and to continue his struggle on Wednesday.”

Video recorded Tuesday and broadcast on Venezuelan television showed Venezuelan army soldiers taking back armored cars seized by the opposition.

“So yesterday, May Day, the government, who had already planned a traditional May Day march for the workers, made a new call for the people to come onto the streets and defend the national territory from this attempted coup d’etat — and the people responded,” Dobson said. “The march seen in Caracas has been described by many analysts as one of the largest Chavista marches in recent years.”

Dobson noted the opposition also “held an activity in eastern Caracas” that was “considerably smaller” and turned violent in the evening hours amid confrontations with the police and national guard, resulting in one death.

“Juan Guaido is free, still roaming the streets, but it can only be considered a complete failure for him, both in terms of achieving his political objectives, but also any sort of projection of power or domination here in the country. He is looking weaker now than he ever has been in the past,” Dobson said.

Condon told Sputnik that during his trip to Venezuela just before the most recent coup attempt, there was “no visible support for the opposition whatsoever” in the large, poor, working class districts. “I doubt, frankly, that Juan Guaido would even dare set foot in those barrios. He’s not welcome there. There’s a huge class divide; the opposition is largely white, middle class, of course led by wealthy ultra-right [wing] oligarchs, and they have even attacked people of color at those opposition marches, because if you have dark skin, you’re assumed to be a Chavista — a supporter of the government.”

Calling the most recent coup attempt a “Hail Mary pass, a hope and a prayer,” Condon said it seemed “staged more for the US audience. The real coup took place in the media… consistently [in] all of the mainstream media, there’s not a single voice you hear on the media against the US intervention, against the regime change effort. So it’s, in a sense, quite a big propaganda coup in the US media, aimed at the US people, perhaps preparing the way for a US military intervention.”

The activist said Veterans for Peace was calling on US soldiers to “resist participation in any military action” in Venezuela, noting that he expected “massive resistance” to such action, both on the ground by militias organized in the barrios, but also by the US soldiers themselves, who are “just fed up with having been deployed to one failed war based on lies after another.”

“I think that [US President Donald] Trump and his gang have kind of thrown down, they’ve kind of announced to the world that they are going to overthrow the Venezuelan government. I think they’re almost going to have to do something just to try to save face,” Condon said. “But I think their options, nonmilitary and military, are very limited, and I’m hopeful the resistance in Venezuela and around the world in solidarity with the Venezuelan people is going to triumph, and we’re going to turn a corner in the history of this hemisphere.”

May 3, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

A Desperate Empire Crashes in Venezuela

By Maximilian Forte | Zero Anthropology | May 1, 2019

The April 30, 2019, coup attempt in Venezuela has come and gone. The coup has failed. “Failed state” theory just got a lot more complicated. No longer can the “failed state” designation apply only to those states targeted for recolonization after a prolonged period of destabilization and foreign intervention. Now “failed state” theory has to apply to a degenerate imperial state at its wit’s end, and to the failure of its proxies on the ground, as well as the failure of its invented political fictions to materialize. Even worse than any “failed state,” is the failure of aspirants to power who pretend to have power—namely, the incompetent Venezuelan opposition activist, Juán Guaidó. It’s time that even the few critical media outlets left stop dignifying Guaidó, opposition activist, with the title of self-declared “interim president,” because even that is too grandiose.

This so-called “interim president” is, by the tortured logic of Elliot Abrams, the president of an interim that has not yet begun. So that means he is not the interim president even. Or, he was the interim president, but his 30-day term (as specified by the Constitution), expired months ago. Or, he is still the interim president, but only if a defunct opposition body, that calls itself the National Assembly, believes it has the authority to unilaterally overwrite the Constitution—it does not, so he is still not even a self-declared interim president. This is what the US wants the world to recognize as “interim president”: a total fiction that cannot be sustained without reference to other fictions.

This bundle of fictions has not even been wielded by people who have the good sense to know when it’s time to shut up. No, instead the authors of these inventions spin even more, as if wanting to be spotted in all their foolishness. So we had the US government almost triumphantly declaring that it was withdrawing US diplomats from Venezuela—when Venezuela’s government was the one that ordered them out. Then we had US officials rejoice that Venezuela’s representatives had been expelled from the Organization of American States—when Venezuela already declared it was withdrawing from the OAS two years ago, and this month marked the final step in the process. Then we had the US State Department pretend that it could hand the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, DC, over to representatives of an interim president of an interim that had not even started, or that already ended. One has to really have faith in the stupidity of audiences, and be unflinching about treating everyone as idiots, to mount such an absurd production in public. It also means that they literally have no shame.

Impressive “uprising” you have there.

As a bad work of fiction, Guaidó could not mount even a lame imitation of a military-backed coup on April 30, which is just the latest in a long line of his failures this year. This character, unknown to 80% of Venezuelans a few months ago, leader of a minority party in a defunct parliament, who never campaigned for the presidency and was never elected to it—this same character posed in front of cameras and claimed military backing which he never had. So he calls on the resources of a hostile foreign power in the vain hope it make his fiction reality, clearly showing he understands nothing at all. Even worse: it shows a total lack of any care for all those who would suffer and die in war—Guaidó is ready to sacrifice them all. It’s an ill bird that fouls its own nest.

The response to Guaidó’s call? A few hundred violent protesters showed up, traded rocks with the Bolivarian National Guard, and then stood around talking to each other for hours on end. John Bolton, pushing US intervention in the name of keeping Venezuela free of external dominance (he knows no irony), even tried to nudge Venezuelans in a pitiful attempt at bribery, promising US economic relief if Guaidó took power. As far as attempted coups go, this was fortunately among the most pathetic, lame farces. There is now no resemblance between Venezuela 2019 and Libya 2011, where in the latter case opponents actually seized towns and cities and mounted protests that lasted days on end. What remains the same in the two cases is the determination of the US to implement through violent proxies a fiction of rule.

One also has to wonder how John Bolton, Mike Pompeo, and Elliot Abrams still have jobs today. Trump is not a tower of managerial business acumen after all—if one ever believed the fiction constituting his performance on The Apprentice. Bolton, who was most prominent during the April 30 coup farce, could not even keep himself from tripping over his own excremental attempt at a “narrative”. First, John Bolton called on the Venezuelan military to side with Guaidó—but then invalidated his call, turning around and asserting that, in any case, Venezuela was under (imaginary) Cuban occupation, and it was Cuban troops who were really in charge. So everything fell apart… because of Cuba, and thus Trump threatened Cuba with an embargo, which it has already been under for six decades. Cuba was the fiction used to mask another fiction—the only thing that was real here was how utterly ridiculous US empire has become.

All the action, caught live on camera.

On the night of April 30, as I often do I listened to live radio from Caracas, where the assembled panellists spent a good amount of time engaged in the healthiest, most robust guffawing I have heard in ages. The subject of their laughter? Erik Prince, the war criminal who headed BlackWater and is now begging Trump for cash in return for a “plan”—a plan to send a grand total of 5,000 mercenaries to Venezuela. On RNV radio they wondered if the Americans had really become so stupid and psychotic to think that 5,000 clowns could take and hold so much as a bakery in a country which has 2,000,000 armed citizens in militias alone, not counting the hundreds of thousands in the armed forces and the paramilitary police. Apparently Prince mixed up Venezuela with Grenada—and even in Grenada it took US Marines a week to subdue armed opposition from a comparatively tiny group of diehard patriots.

Nothing is working for the US, not even what might be the most extreme sanctions ever imposed, and weeks of power outages. Certainly, none of the “humanitarian” theatre worked, whether it was the forced “aid” stunt, or the myth that Venezuelan troops set their fake aid on fire. The US was forced to imagine and fantasize about Maduro fleeing the country: witness Mike Pompeo’s bout of deranged lying about Maduro getting on a plane to Cuba, until Russia stopped him. Fictions, lies, propaganda, disinformation, fake news. To top it all off, the news came: this was not even a coup, you see. The real problem here, with such a monumental loss of face, in such a magnificent failure as April 30, is that the US will turn to even more desperate and thus more dangerous measures. However, that comes at a real cost: if the US invades, Trump has to go into an electoral contest with a new war on his back, and it’s not like such a war would come even close to a “cake walk”.

One has to wonder: will those national leaders who—without the authorization of their citizens—unilaterally “recognized” Guaidó as this so-called “interim president” thing, now take stock finally? Or will they cling to this science-fiction that there is a popular movement opposing Nicolás Maduro’s legitimate and very real government?

Clearly, very clearly as it was televised live worldwide all day on April 30 for all to see, Guaidó does not lead a popular movement. He has no authority, no legitimacy, and only a paltry amount of futile support. This so-called “uprising” was an embarrassing failure for his own image as a supposed leader. Then he takes shelter and says “tomorrow, more protests”—yes, junior, that will do the trick. Remember, sport, more always works, and besides, “there’s always tomorrow”. Keep at it, son.

This is what practice without theory looks like. This is what a “movement” without support looks like. This is what science-fiction looks like when it tries to escape the theatre and mingle with real people in the street.

Meanwhile, members of the Lima Group such as Canada, and those members of the European Union that have called for a “peaceful transition” in Venezuela, there is a lot for which they must answer. What “democracy” do they think it is where someone, not elected by the people, marshals the forces of violence in an effort to impose a government on a country? If this were to be done in their countries, would they accept it as democracy? This is the other outrageous fiction that we face: that we in North America live in democratic polities. Democracy should recognize itself in democracy—but when you instead recognize your partner in a violent clutch of putschists, then what are you?

May 1, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Coup Attempt In Venezuela

Venezuelanalysis | April 30, 2019

Caracas – A military coup attempt is underway in Venezuela on Tuesday, April 30, with imprisoned right wing leader Leopoldo Lopez, and self-proclaimed “Interim President” Juan Guaido and some members of the armed forces blocking a highway in Caracas and calling on the military to rise up

According to reports, a group from Venezuela’s Sebin intelligence service freed Leopoldo Lopez from house arrest early Tuesday morning. Lopez then joined Guaido and a handful of members from different branches of the armed forces in the Altamira highway in eastern Caracas close to La Carlota airbase. Lopez and Guaido published videos on social media calling on other elements of the armed forces to join the uprising and on their supporters to take to the streets. Guaido vowed that this was the “final phase” in ousting the Maduro government.

The Venezuelan government promptly reacted, condemning the coup attempt and vowing that it would be defeated.

“We inform the Venezuelan people that right now we are facing and deactivating a small group of traitor soldiers who have positioned themselves on the Altamira overpass to attempt a coup against the state and the constitution,” Communications Minister Jorge Rodriguez tweeted.

The President of the National Constituent Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, spoke on state television, vowing that the uprising would be defeated and that those responsible would have to “assume their responsibilities.” He also called on the people and the Bolivarian militia to go out on the streets and defend Miraflores Palace.

For his part, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López reported that military units throughout the country reported total normalcy, and that the military remain loyal to President Maduro.

At the time of writing, Guaido’s followers are taking to the streets both in Caracas and other parts of the country, blocking roads in support of his new call for a coup. Minor confrontations with tear gas have been reported outside La Carlota air base in Caracas.

Guaido had previously called for the “largest march in Venezuela’s history” scheduled for Wednesday May 1, while a Chavista march celebrating workers’ day was also expected to take place.

teleSUR update:

Venezuela’s Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino rejected the coup attempt and said that the country’s legitimate military forces would respond to any attempt to overthrow the government of Nicolas Maduro.

“We reject this coup movement that aims to fill the country with violence. The pseudo-political leaders who have placed themselves at the forefront of this subversive movement have used troops and police with weapons of war on a public road in the city to create anxiety and terror.”

April 30, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | | Leave a comment

Canada Gets Cozy with Repressive Middle East Monarchies

By Yves Engler | Dissident Voice | April 26, 2019

While Justin Trudeau’s government embraces repressive Middle East monarchies, they want us to believe their campaign to oust Venezuela’s government is motivated by support for democracy and human rights.

On a tour of the Middle East last week Defence Minister Harjit Singh Sajjan met his United Arab Emirates counterpart Mohammed bin Ahmed Al Bowardi in Abu Dhabi. According to Emirates News Agency, Canadian and UAE officials discussed “cooperation in the military and defence sectors” at a time when the oil rich nation plays a key role in the horrendous violence in Yemen.

The Trudeau government is promoting arm sales to the UAE and other regional monarchies. With support from “15 trade commissioners and representatives from the Government of Ontario, National Defence, Global Affairs Canada, and the Canadian Commercial Corporation”, 50 Canadian arms companies flogged their wares at the Abu Dhabi-based International Defence Exhibition and Conference (IDEX) in February. To help the arms companies move their wares, Commander of the Bahrain-based Combined Task Force 150, Commodore Darren Garnier, led a Canadian military delegation to IDEX.

During his recent tour Sajjan met King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein in Jordan. He discussed military cooperation with a monarch known for prosecuting individuals for “extending one’s tongue” (having a big mouth) against the King. At the end of March, Trudeau phoned King Abdullah II.

On April 9 the Canadian and Jordanian armed forces broke ground on a road project along the Jordanian-Syrian border. During a ceremony for the Canadian-funded initiative Commander of the Canadian Joint Operations Command, Lieutenant General Michael Rouleau, said: “this important road rehabilitation project is a tangible example of the close relationship between Jordan and Canada. It will help keep the people of Jordan safe by allowing the Jordanian armed forces to deter, monitor and interdict incursions along the northern border with Syria, which will help to enhance security in Jordan and in the region.”

On his Middle East tour Sajjan also met Kuwait’s Prime Minister and Defence Minister Sheikh Nasser Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah who is part of a family that has ruled for 250 years. According to the Kuwait News Agency, Canada’s defence minister “stressed deep relations between Kuwait and Canada and pointed out mutual willingness to bolster and consolidate bilateral ties.”

Earlier in the month finance minister Bill Morneau and Parliamentary Secretary Omar Alghabra participated in the inaugural Kuwait and Canada Investment Forum. At the time Alghabra wrote, “let’s celebrate and continue our efforts to grow the relationship between Canada and Kuwait in investments, trade and defence.”

Military ties with Kuwait are important because the Canadian forces have a small base there. In December the Canadian Navy took command of Combined Task Force 150 from their Saudi counterparts. Canada also has a small number of troops in the monarchies of Bahrain, the UAE and Qatar.

Last month Canada’s Ambassador to Qatar Stefanie McCollum boasted of growing relations between the countries, claiming “our values structures are very similar.” In an interview with Al Bawaba the Canadian diplomat also said Ottawa is seeking to deepen business ties with the natural gas rich monarchy and that the two countries are in the final stage of signing a defence cooperation agreement.

Notwithstanding the diplomatic spat last summer, the Trudeau government has mostly continued business as usual with the most powerful and repressive monarchy in the region. Recently foreign minister Chrystia Freeland looked the other way when Saudi student Mohammed Zuraibi Alzoabi fled Canada — presumably with help from the embassy — to avoid sexual assault charges in Cape Breton. While Freeland told reporters that Global Affairs was investigating the matter, Halifax Chronicle Herald journalist Aaron Beswick’s Access to Information request suggests they didn’t even bother contacting the Saudi embassy concerning the matter.

According to an access request by PhD researcher Anthony Fenton, Freeland phoned new Saudi foreign minister Ibrahim Abdulaziz Al-Assaf in January. In briefing notes for the (unannounced) discussion Freeland was encouraged to tell her counterpart (under the headline “points to register” regarding Yemen): “Appreciate the hard work and heavy lifting by the Saudis and encourage ongoing efforts in this regard.”

Despite their devastating war in Yemen and dismembering of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the consulate in Istanbul, Saudi Arabia continues to receive large shipments of Canadian weaponry. 2018 was a record year for Canadian rifle and armoured vehicle sales to the Saudis. $17.64 million in rifles were exported to the kingdom last year and another $1.896 million worth of guns were delivered in February. In the first month of this year Canada exported $367 million worth of “tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles” to the Saudis.

As Fenton has documented in detail on his highly informative Twitter handle, armoured vehicles made by Canadian company Streit Group in the UAE have been repeatedly videoed in Yemen. Equipment from three other Canadian armoured vehicle makers – Terradyne, IAG Guardian and General Dynamics – was found with Saudi-backed forces in Yemen. The Saudi-led coalition used Canadian-made rifles as well.

On Tuesday the Saudis beheaded 37 mostly minority Shiites. Ottawa waited 48 hours — after many other countries criticized the mass execution — to release a “muted” statement. The Trudeau government has stayed mum on the Saudi’s recent effort to derail pro-democracy demonstrations in Sudan and Algeria as well as Riyadh’s funding for Libyan warlord Khalifa Haftar’s bid to seize Tripoli by force.

The close and friendly relationships between the Trudeau government and repressive Middle East monarchies demonstrates how little the Liberals care about democracy abroad and illustrates the hypocrisy of Canada’s claims that its efforts to oust Venezuela’s government is all about supporting democracy.

Yves Engler is the author of 10 books, including A Propaganda System: How Canada’s Government, Corporations, Media and Academia Sell War and Exploitation.

April 27, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Lift sanctions & apologize if you want to talk,’ Iran’s Rouhani tells Washington

RT | April 24, 2019

The US should first drop sanctions and apologize, if it wants to sit down for negotiations, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said, after Washington stepped up “maximum pressure” on Tehran.

“Negotiation is only possible if all the pressures are lifted, they apologize for their illegal actions and there is mutual respect,” Rouhani said on Wednesday.

He stated that Tehran is open to talks with Washington, but the US is simply “not ready for any dialogue” and only seeks to “subdue the people of Iran.”

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, meanwhile, said that the country will thwart any attempts of the US to block its oil trade.

“The efforts to boycott the sale of Iran’s oil won’t get them anywhere. We will export our oil as much as we need and we intend,” Khamenei wrote on Twitter.

“They should know that their hostile measure won’t be left without a response.”

The warning came after US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, announced that Washington will stop issuing sanction waivers for the buyers of Iranian oil. It was done as part of the campaign to apply “maximum pressure” on Tehran, he said.

The two states remained in a diplomatic standoff after President Donald Trump unilaterally pulled the US out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on the Iranian nuclear program last year. The US then re-imposed sanctions on Iran’s energy and banking sectors.

Iran blasted the sanctions as illegal under international law and vowed to retaliate should Washington make moves to attack its oil shipment.

Earlier this month, the US listed Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a “terrorist organization.” Tehran responded in kind by doing the same with the US Central Command (CENTCOM).

April 24, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

The Conspiracy Against Trump

The Deep State plot to undermine the president

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • April 23, 2019

The real “deplorable” in today’s United States is the continuation of a foreign policy based on endless aggression to maintain Washington’s military dominance in parts of the world where Americans have no conceivable interest. Many voters backed Donald J. Trump because he committed himself to changing all that, but, unfortunately, he has reneged on his promise, instead heightening tension with major powers Russia and China while also threatening Iran and Venezuela on an almost daily basis. Now Cuba is in the crosshairs because it is allegedly assisting Venezuela. One might reasonably ask if America in its seemingly enduring role as the world’s most feared bully will ever cease and desist, but the more practical question might be “When will the psychopathic trio of John Bolton, Mike Pompeo and Elliott Abrams be fired so the United States can begin to behave like a normal nation?”

Trump, to be sure, is the heart of the problem as he has consistently made bad, overly belligerent decisions when better and less abrasive options were available, something that should not necessarily always be blamed on his poor choice of advisers. But one also should not discount the likelihood that the dysfunction in Trump is in part comprehensible, stemming from his belief that he has numerous powerful enemies who have been out to destroy him since before he was nominated as the GOP’s presidential candidate. This hatred of all things Trump has been manifested in the neoconservative “Nevertrump” forces led by Bill Kristol and by the “Trump Derangement Syndrome” prominent on the political left, regularly exhibited by Rachel Maddow.

And then there is the Deep State, which also worked with the Democratic Party and President Barack Obama to destroy the Trump presidency even before it began. One can define Deep State in a number of ways, ranging from a “soft” version which accepts that there is an Establishment that has certain self-serving objectives that it works collectively to promote to something harder, an actual infrastructure that meets together and connives to remove individuals and sabotage policies that it objects to. The Deep State in either version includes senior government officials, business leaders and, perhaps most importantly, the managed media, which promotes a corrupted version of “good governance” that in turn influences the public.

Whether the Mueller report is definitive very much depends on the people they chose to interview and the questions they chose to ask, which is something that will no doubt be discussed for the next year if not longer. Beyond declaring that the Trump team did not collude with Russia, it cast little light on the possible Deep State role in attempting to vilify Trump and his associates. The investigation of that aspect of the 2016 campaign and the possible prosecutions of former senior government officials that might be a consequence of the investigation will likely be entertaining conspiracy theorists well into 2020. Since Russiagate has already been used and discarded the new inquiry might well be dubbed Trumpgate.

The media has scarcely reported how Michael Horowitz, the Inspector General of the Department of Justice (DOJ), has been looking into the activities of the principal promoters of the Russiagate fraud. Horowitz, whose report is expected in about a month, has already revealed that he intends to make criminal referrals as a result of his investigation. While the report will only cover malfeasance in the Department of Justice, which includes the FBI, the names of intelligence officers involved will no doubt also surface. It is expected that there will be charges leading to many prosecutions and one can hope for jail time for those individuals who corruptly betrayed their oath to the United States Constitution to pursue a political vendetta.

A review of what is already known about the plot against Trump is revealing and no doubt much more will be learned if and when investigators go through emails and phone records. The first phase of the illegal investigation of the Trump associates involved initiating wiretaps without any probable cause. This eventually involved six government intelligence and law enforcement agencies that formed a de facto task force headed by the CIA’s Director John Brennan. Also reportedly involved were the FBI’s James Comey, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Department of Homeland Security Director Jeh Johnson, and Admiral Michael Rogers who headed the National Security Agency.

Brennan was the key to the operation because the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court refused to approve several requests by the FBI to initiate taps on Trump associates and Trump Tower as there was no probable cause to do so but the British and other European intelligence services were legally able to intercept communications linked to American sources. Brennan was able to use his connections with those foreign intelligence agencies, primarily the British GCHQ, to make it look like the concerns about Trump were coming from friendly and allied countries and therefore had to be responded to as part of routine intelligence sharing. As a result, Paul Manafort, Carter Page, Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Gen. Michael Flynn were all wiretapped. And likely there were others. This all happened during the primaries and after Trump became the GOP nominee.

In other words, to make the wiretaps appear to be legitimate, GCHQ and others were quietly and off-the-record approached by Brennan and associates over their fears of what a Trump presidency might mean. The British responded by initiating wiretaps that were then used by Brennan to justify further investigation of Trump’s associates. It was all neatly done and constituted completely illegal spying on American citizens by the U.S. government.

The British support of the operation was coordinated by the then-director of GCHQ Robert Hannigan who has since been forced to resign. Brennan is, unfortunately still around and has not been charged with perjury and other crimes. In May 2017, after he departed government, he testified before Congress with what sounds a lot like a final unsourced, uncorroborated attempt to smear the new administration: “I encountered and am aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign that I was concerned about because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals. It raised questions in my mind whether or not Russia was able to gain the co-operation of those individuals.”

Brennan’s claimed “concerns” turned out to be incorrect. Meanwhile, other interested parties were involved in the so-called Steele Dossier on Trump himself. The dossier, paid for initially by Republicans trying to stop Trump, was later funded by $12 million from the Hillary campaign. It was commissioned by the law firm Perkins Coie, which was working for the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The objective was to assess any possible Trump involvement with Russia. The work itself was sub-contracted to Fusion GPS, which in turn sub-contracted the actual investigation to British spy Christopher Steele who headed a business intelligence firm called Orbis.

Steele left MI-6 in 2009 and had not visited Russia since 1993. The report, intended to dig up dirt on Trump, was largely prepared using impossible to corroborate second-hand information and would have never surfaced but for the surprise result of the 2016 election. Christopher Steele gave a copy to a retired of British Diplomat Sir Andrew Wood who in turn handed it to Trump critic Senator John McCain who then passed it on to the FBI. President Barack Obama presumably also saw it and, according to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, “If it weren’t for President Obama, we might not have done the intelligence community assessment that we did that set off a whole sequence of events which are still unfolding today, notably, special counsel Mueller’s investigation.”

The report was leaked to the media in January 2017 to coincide with Trump’s inauguration. Hilary Clinton denied any prior knowledge despite the fact that her campaign had paid for it. Pressure from the Democrats and other constituencies devastated by the Trump victory used the Steele report to provide leverage for what became the Mueller investigation.

So, was there a broad ranging conspiracy against Donald Trump orchestrated by many of the most senior officials and politicians in Washington? Undeniably yes. What Trump has amounted to as a leader and role model is beside the point as what evolved was undeniably a bureaucratic coup directed against a legally elected president of the United States and to a certain extent it was successful as Trump was likely forced to turn his back on his better angels and subsequently hired Pompeo, Bolton and Abrams. One can only hope that investigators dig deep into what Washington insiders have been up to so Trumpgate will prove more interesting and informative than was Russiagate. And one also has to hope that enough highest-level heads will roll to make any interference by the Deep State in future elections unthinkable. One hopes.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

April 22, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Pakistan And Iran Enter New Era of Anti-Terror Cooperation

By Adam Garrie | EurasiaFuture | 2019-04-22

Just as the PKK and its sister organisation PJAK are a mutual threat to both Turkey and Iran’s western frontier, so too are terror groups active on the Iran-Pakistan border a mutual threat to both countries that are best neutralised through joint efforts. This was proved beyond a shadow of a doubt when in February of this year a suicide bomber from Pakistan’s Balochistan frontier with Iran took the lives of 27 Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) soldiers and likewise the message was made doubly clear when last week, terrorists based in the neighbouring Iranian province of Sistan and Baluchestan crossed into Pakistan disguised as soldiers and martyred 14 innocent people at point blank range after boarding a bus on the Makran Coastal Highway.

As the Makran Coastal Highway attack came days before Pakistani Prime Minister’s first visit to Iran, it may well have been a calculated provocation designed to inflame Pakistan’s relations with Iran during a season when both countries had already experienced a degradation in relations due to Iran’s hyperbolic reaction to the 13 February attack. Mohammad Ali Jafari, at the time the commander-in-chief of the IRGC made inflammatory remarks about seeking “revenge” on Pakistan for an atrocity committed by a non-state terror group proscribed as an enemy of Pakistan. Jafari’s unambiguous comments which blamed Pakistani state institutions for the attack on the IRGC cast a new narrative over the region which lead one to logically conclude that India’s investments in the Iranian port at Chabahar combined with a misunderstanding of Pakistan’s partnership with Saudi Arabia, led Iranian officials into saying things that should not have been said about a potentially strategically important neighbour.

By contrast, after the Makran Coastal Highway attack, Pakistan launched a formal diplomatic complaint to Iran and the Foreign Minister stated that the issue would be a top priority during Imran Khan’s meeting with the Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

News has now broken that a breakthrough has in fact been reached as Pakistan and Iran have agreed to form a joint border patrol “reaction force” that will see Pakistani and Iranian soldiers police an erstwhile porous border that has led to deeply unfortunate attacks on both countries from terrorists who have no regard for either Pakistani nor Iranian national sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Even before the announcement of the joint reaction force, there were indications that Iran’s top leadership had realised the errors that were made in February in respect of blaming Pakistan for an attack that should have been a clear indicator of the fact the further cooperation was urgently needed. Yesterday, Iran’s Supreme Leader Sayyid Ali Hosseini Khamenei relieved Mohammad Ali Jafari of his duties as the IRGC commander-in-chief and replaced him with Brigadier General Hossein Salami. It is likely that the change of the guard in this respect was motivated by internal factors but the timing of the announcement has the optics of a good will gesture to Pakistan as Jafari was among the most unhinged when it came to slandering Pakistani state institutions in February. As geopolitical expert Andrew Korybko wrote last week, “the ball is in Iran’s court” and it seems that this time Tehran did in fact make the proper decision to favour win-win cooperation over totally unnecessary lose-lose antagonism and suspicion.

Overall, Iran and Pakistan have the potential to be important strategic partners in areas beyond the all-important matter of cross-border security and counter-terrorism cooperation. In the long term, Iran could form an important part of a wider CPEC+. Such a Belt and Road based trading structure could potentially see goods originating from China before travelling across CPEC to Gwadar, then being shipped to Iran where they could then either travel to north-west Eurasia via the Caucasus or otherwise into the Mediterranean via Iran’s Turkish neighbour, thus bypassing the Suez region in which Israel and other enemies of Iran hold a great deal of influence.

In terms of energy cooperation, the long anticipated pipeline from Iran into south Asia is a project that has been stalled but nevertheless holds great potential for new win-win energy exchange in the region.

Finally, as geopolitical expert Agha Hussain recently pointed out, if Iran is to bolster its pan-Islamic credentials at a time when the country is facing unique challenges from the west, Israel and parts of the Arab world, it would behove Tehran to embrace the cause of Kashmiri justice just as the country has since its inception as an Islamic Republic, embraced the cause of Palestinian justice. Not only would this help demonstrate that Iran’s Islamic Revolution is more than just a single issue geopolitical development but it would help to eliminate many of the false stereotypes that some Pakistanis have about Iran and that some Iranians have about Pakistan.

The task now for both countries is to make sure that the reaction force is well-equipped and that cooperation along the border can help to create a new era of win-win relations for both neighbours.

April 22, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Trump, Erdogan seek reset of US-Turkey ties

By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | April 21, 2019

Even as the countdown has begun before the first batch of Russian-made S-400 missiles will arrive in Turkey — expected in coming ten weeks from now — a crisis situation envelops the Turkish-American relationship. No doubt, this crisis, unless resolved in the coming days or weeks, could have profound consequences for the future of the western alliance system as a whole and the geopolitics of Eurasia and the Middle East.

What distinguishes the crisis from the run-of-the-mill spats that keep frequenting the Turkey-US relationship every now and then is that at issue here is Turkey’s vulnerability, if it proceeds with the S-400 deal, to US retribution under the 2017 law known as the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, or CAATSA, which is directed against Russian arms industry but becomes applicable to third parties that enter into arms deals with Moscow.

If CAATSA sanctions click in, Turkey, which is mired in recession due to the US pressure tactic on its economy, may descend into a free fall of its currency. Incipient signs are already available. Even minor US sanctions could trigger another sharp sell-off in the Turkish lira that deepens the recession. Last year, Turkish lira shed 30 percent of its value, and the currency is down another 10 percent recently, and markets remain on edge.

Simply put, Turkey is so much integrated into the western economies and banking system that any US sanctions would inevitably have a crippling effect. And if there is one message out of Turkey’s recent local elections, it is that the state of the domestic economy could directly impact President Recep Erdogan’s political standing. The point is, despite all the brave chatter about dethroning the dollar, the hard reality is that the US is in a position to “weaponise” the dollar for the foreseeable future and all the King’s men and all the King’s horses — in Moscow and Beijing or Tehran and Caracas or wherever — have to live with that reality.

Besides, in Turkey’s case, a life outside the Western system is simply unthinkable. The Turkish elite are acutely conscious of Ataturk’s legacy that the modernisation of the country demands integration with the West. True, Turkey under President Recep Erdogan is redefining its identity but reclaiming Ottoman legacies in the Muslim Middle East does not and will not mean turning the back on Europe. Paradoxically, Turkey’s strategic autonomy is best preserved by being part of the western alliance system, considering the country’s tough neighbourhood.

No doubt, the stakes are high for Turkey. Unsurprisingly, soon after the visit to Moscow on April 8, Erdogan decided to depute a high-powered team of officials to Washington. The indications are that Erdogan came away from Moscow not quite convinced of the Kremlin’s assiduous wooing of him with an alternative non-western road map for Turkey’s future. At any rate, a team of senior Turkish ministers visited Washington last week for talks aimed at easing the crisis, which included the powerful Finance Minister Berat Albayrak, son-in-law of Erdogan.

The hugely consequential mission of Turkish ministers (which also included Defence Minister Hulusi Akar and Erdogan’s key advisor Ibrahim Kalin) culminated in an unexpected Oval Office meeting for Albayrak with President Donald Trump, with only son-in-law and top aide Jared Kushner and US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin present.

Turkish officials have since exuded optimism that Trump has a “more positive attitude” to Turkey’s pleas than the US Congress where Turkey has almost no cheerleaders.

The catch, however, is that CAATSA, which was legislated in the backdrop of Trump’s alleged “Russia collusion”,  has been written precisely with the idea that Trump will have no loopholes to bypass it or dilute the sanctions legislation against Russian arms industry. In fact, for granting a waiver to Turkey in the present case, Trump by law would have to show that the S-400 purchase was not a “significant transaction”, and that it would not endanger the integrity of NATO or adversely affect US military operations.

Again, Trump would also need to show in a letter to congressional committees that the S-400 missile deal would not lead to a “significant negative impact” on US-Turkish cooperation, and that Turkey is taking, or will take, steps over a specific period to reduce its Russian-made defence equipment and weapons. It is a difficult proposition, but doable — provided there is political will.

Trump’s decision to receive Albayrak — it is absolutely unprecedented for POTUS to hold talks with a visiting finance minister — signals that the great dealmaker is on the prowl and would have some formula under his sleeve. Significantly, Trump has not weighed in on Turkey in recent weeks. A senior Turkish official told Reuters that the talks in Washington were “more positive than expected” and the Americans expressed “a softer tone” than they take in public. Another Turkish official added, “There might certainly be some steps to be taken but the search for common ground will continue.”

The Acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told reporters on Thursday: “We’re closer” to a final decision on the S-400s after a meeting with his Turkish counterpart. “It’s like: ‘OK, where are we stuck? How do we get unstuck?” he said of the talks, adding he was optimistic and hopeful of visiting Turkey for the formal transfer of F-35 stealth aircraft, which Turkey plans to buy and Washington is threatening to block if Turkey pressed ahead with the S-400 deal with Russia.

Of course, the Turkish-American relationship is littered with several other disputes too — military strategy in the Syrian conflict, Iran sanctions, Turkey’s extradition request to Washington in regard of the Muslim cleric Fetullah Gulen (whom Ankara blames for a failed 2016 military coup) and so on. But the crisis over the S-400 missile deal is the mother of all disputes, since it is directly linked to the viability of the 7-decades old Turkish-American alliance, the Russian strategies in the Black Sea and Eastern Mediterranean, US-Russia tensions and the US’ capacity to influence the Middle East politics as a whole.

What is happening is that after a brinkmanship played out through months at different levels, the crisis over the S-400 affair is reaching a nail-biting finish, with Turkey and the US having reached the edge of the precipice, peering into the abyss and not liking what they see in the darkness and groping for a way to pull back somehow. If they succeed, it will have to be on a “win-win” basis. Read a commentary in the pro-government Turkish daily Sabah entitled This picture gives us hope. 

April 21, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

It is safer to be a cop today than 50 years ago

Homeland Security News Wire | April 11, 2019

There is no doubt that policing is a dangerous profession. But is it safer to be a cop today than it was fifty years ago? Yes, according to a study that analyzed police officer deaths (felonious and non-felonious) in the United States from 1970 to 2016.

The study represents one of the most comprehensive assessments of the “dangerousness” of policing to date and provides an important historical context on the ongoing dialogue over a perceived “war on cops” in recent years.

Researchers from Florida Atlantic University, Arizona State University, and the University of Texas at El Paso, found that despite increases in violent crimes, the hazards of policing has dramatically declined since 1970 with a 75 percent drop in police officer line-of-duty deaths. FAU notes that the study also refutes the theory of “war on cops,” following the Ferguson effect and Michael Brown’s death in August 2014, and finds no evidence to support those claims.

“On average, there were slightly more than 1.6 fewer felonious police officer deaths per month after Michael Brown’s death in August 2014 when compared with pre-August 2014,” said Lisa Dario, Ph.D., co-author and an assistant professor in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice in FAU’s College for Design and Social Inquiry. “This result directly contradicts the hypothesized war on cops, in which an increase in felonious killings after August 2014 is predicted. Our results show the opposite. In the context of nearly 50-year monthly trends, our results show a statistically significant decline in felonious killings of police after Michael Brown’s death.”

Results of the study, published in the Journal of Criminology & Public Policy , show that felonious deaths dropped by more than 80 percent. The only anomaly is 2001 when more than 70 officers were killed during the 9/11 terrorist attack. The rate of non-felonious deaths also declined by 69 percent. Furthermore, the gap between felonious and non-felonious deaths closed over time. Officer deaths peaked in 1974 at 272; in 2016 there were 134 deaths.

April 20, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | | Leave a comment

Mideast States Join Iraq Summit in Blow to US-Led ‘Arab NATO’ Initiative

Sputnik – April 20, 2019

The summit marks a shift in Iraq’s foreign policy, with the country assuming the role of a mediator in the region as US President Donald Trump has revived the Obama-era concept of an anti-Iranian alliance of Gulf nations.

Iraq is hosting a one-day summit, which brings together the country’s neighbours: Syria, Turkey, Jordan, and Kuwait, as well as two long-time rivals – Saudi Arabia and Iran – in a blow to the US-led “Arab NATO” initiative, Press TV reported.

“This is a positive message to all neighbouring countries and the world that Iraq is determined to regain its health and return to its Arab, regional environment and assume its rightful place in the map of the balance of power”, Bashir Haddad, deputy parliamentary speaker said.

The development comes as US President Donald Trump breathed new life into the Obama-era initiative, “Middle East Strategic Alliance”, commonly referred to as “Arab NATO”, to forge an anti-Iran alliance of Gulf nations.

In 2017, the Trump administration suggested creating an alliance to stop what the US called Tehran’s “malign activities” in the Middle East.

The plan, first proposed by Saudi Arabia in 2017, was promoted by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who even met with Qatari officials last year in a bid to deescalate tensions between Doha and Riyadh to push the idea forward.

Aside from the US and Saudi Arabia, the so-called Middle East Strategic Alliance would hypothetically include the UAE, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Jordan and Egypt to counter Iran, deepen defence relations, energy cooperation and deal with regional threats.  However, Egypt reportedly dealt the first blow to the proposal last week, having withdrawn from the initiative over concerns of damaging relations with Iran.

April 20, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

Kim Jong-un May be The World’s Most Strategic Head of State

By Adam Garrie | EurasiaFuture | April 18, 2019

Last night it was confirmed that the DPRK tested a new tactical guided weapon. While this particular weapon does not violate the agreement by Pyongyang to refrain from testing ICMBs and nuclear warheads during the course of the peace process, it would be impossible to argue that the test is unrelated to the public disappointment that Kim Jong-un has voiced at the lack of progress on sanctions relief in the aftermath of the largely uneventful Hanoi summit between himself and Donald Trump.

Thus, the DPRK was able to show that it continues to develop its domestic defence industry while remaining committed to the letter of the no-ICMB/no-nuclear testing agreements which have thus far provided a foundation for the ongoing peace process. At the same time, the test is an indication that Kim Jong-un was not bluffing when he gave until the end of 2019 as a deadline for progress in the ongoing peace process before his country would examine alternative paths forward.

But most importantly was the timing. On the morning of the 18th (Washington D.C. time) it was known that the full contents of the Robert Mueller report would be made public (minus certain redactions). Because US Attorney General Barr’s previous summery of the report made it clear that the US President has been exonerated by Mueller, Kim would have known that Donald Trump’s spirits would likely be up as the entire world will now get to read first hand that the man many thought would destroy Trump has ended up vindicating much of what Trump has said over the last three years.

This is crucial for two reasons. First of all, in his recent speech, Kim indicated that while the last few months have seen a downturn in DPRK-US relations, his personal relationship with Donald Trump remains strong. Later, Trump agreed that he has a highly friendly relationship with Kim Jong-un and that he takes an optimistic view on the overall prospects of a successful peace process.

As such, Kim made it clear that yesterday’s new missile test was not intended to embarrass Trump personally. Because Kim and his colleagues (like the rest of the world) will have known that the public release of the Mueller report was coming within hours, Kim could have and self-evidently did use deductive reasoning to assume that short of a world war breaking out, all of US media would be totally fixated on reading and analysing the Mueller report throughout the 18th of April. On a slower news day, the DPRK’s missile test would have otherwise been headline news.

In this sense, Kim was able to make his point but do so in a matter made subtle due to the fact that the weapons test was going to necessarily be obscured by what for Americans is a bigger news story. The DPRK also used this opportunity to reiterate that far from having a problem with Trump, it is Secretary of State Mike Pompeo who Pyongyang views as the main obstacle to progress in the peace talks.

When taken as a whole, the events of the last 24 hours have revealed Kim to be not only a master of grace under pressure but more importantly, a master of combining important messages with a subtle delivery that avoids inflaming the situation.

The stagnation within the peace process since the Hanoi summit may well have made the DPRK’s new missile test inevitable but Kim Jong-un’s understanding of America’s internal political situation has helped to minimise any potentially negative fall out from Washington within the framework of a delicate and extremely important ongoing peace process.

April 19, 2019 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

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